Malarkey’s Burlap to shut down, get re-branded

North County spot will close June 10, be remodeled into a Searsucker restaurant

Burlap, a part of celebrity chef Brian Malarkey's fabric-themed restaurant empire, is closing June 10 and will reopen July 17 as a Searsucker, the highly successful brand with locations in the Gaslamp Quarter, Scottsdale and Austin.

Burlap, a part of celebrity chef Brian Malarkey's fabric-themed restaurant empire, is closing June 10 and will reopen July 17 as a Searsucker, the highly successful brand with locations in the Gaslamp Quarter, Scottsdale and Austin.

Just three weeks after it shuttered its East County outpost, Gingham, celebrity chef Brian Malarkey’s fabric-themed restaurant empire is back in the news with yet another announcement.

The North County restaurant Burlap is being shut down effective June 10 and turned into a Searsucker, the highly successful brand that catapulted Malarkey and his business partner, nightclub impresario James Brennan, to the top of San Diego’s restaurant scene.

The announcement — revealed to U-T San Diego on Friday — was made public today at a staff meeting at the Carmel Valley restaurant, which will go through a quick remodel and reopen on July 17, opening day at Del Mar.

Searsucker, dubbed the “new American classic,” opened in the Gaslamp Quarter in 2010. Its open-kitchen concept proved to be a hit with diners, making the 7,000-square-foot restaurant at Fifth and Market the place to be and be seen.

That brand has been cloned in Arizona and Texas, with the Scottsdale location opening in November of last year and the Austin location opening this past week.

Fire closes newly opened Searsucker in Austin

The Searsucker in Austin, which served its first Friday dinner crowd last night, is closed today after a "fire ripped through the kitchen early Saturday morning," reports the Austin American-Statesman. The culprit appears to be a pan left on the stove burner overnight.

“We have no intentions of doing another Burlap,” Brennan, the CEO of Enlightened Hospitality Group, said Friday afternoon by phone from Scottsdale. “We knew all along that we were going to test-drive different concepts and narrow it down. We’ve identified the two that we want to move forward with: Herringbone and Searsucker.”

Burlap, located in the Del Mar Highlands Town Center strip mall in Carmel Valley, had been described by Malarkey as Asian fusion but was marketed as “Asian cowboy.”

Its interior featured a mix of Asian and western décor in a warehouse setting — picture dragons juxtaposed with cow hide — while its menu boasted Peking duck with lime hoisin and, more recently, the traditional Filipino dish sisig, a pork dish that showcased executive chef Anthony Sinsay’s Filipino heritage.

Brennan said Friday that Sinsay is staying on with the new Searsucker.

The news about Burlap’s re-branding comes just weeks after it was announced that Gingham — the third restaurant opened by Malarkey and Brennan — was closing and being sold to an undisclosed buyer. It is in escrow, so it is expected that a new restaurateur will soon be taking over the downtown La Mesa property.

Burlap was the second fabric-themed restaurant to be rolled out by the Malarkey-Brennan team, opening in summer 2011. The duo has since opened Gabardine in Point Loma, Herringbone in La Jolla, a Searsucker in Scottsdale and a Searsucker in Austin. A second Herringbone is expected to open in Los Angeles at the end of this year.

Brennan said Friday that there are two other cities in the works, but he wouldn’t elaborate.

In March, Herringbone and Searsucker were the only two San Diego eateries that made opentable.com’s list of America’s Hot Spot Restaurants, a list based on more than 5 million restaurant reviews for more than 15,000 restaurants nationwide.